Rhindon
by TheGiftofAslan
Summary: When Peter remains haunted by the ambush that led him to being the White Witch's prisoner, Edmund is there to help Peter past his troubled thoughts. One-Shot. Set after Breaking Magnificence.


A monument to his victories, that was what Rhindon was supposed to represent when Lieutenant Kelo hung Peter's sword on display in the Cair's armory until Peter was ready to use it again. Yet, all that sword did was remain a taunting prop of the blood of his fallen guard and a reminder of the worst six days of his life that followed after they were ambushed.

His sword was no monument; it now was a testament to his greatest defeat.

Peter stood there in his armory, not able to help the fixation he had on his sword. The silence was deafening. Rhindon hung from the frame, displayed as if it was a badge of honor. The sword still seemed too clean to him. It scarcely resembled how it looked when the blood of the Witch's soldiers had coated it before. He could still remember the way the claws forced his sword out of his hand on that terrible day. He could not suppress the shudder that left him. He crossed his arms, hoping to stop the coldness he felt, despite the warm autumn air.

The sword that was once meant to represent the protection and bravery Peter could provide was only a reminder of all of his fear and anguish. Did they not know how haunted he was by that day? Did they not care that the last time he used that sword he had failed the soldiers around him or that those same soldiers died in vain trying to protect him from the White Witch?

A weight rested on his bones, reminding him of his own failures of that awful day. It did not seem to matter how many victories he had in the past, the failure left a terrible hole. Because despite being able to hold Rhindon when they had went with Aslan to the Witch's castle, the entire idea of even using his sword again felt foreign to him.

Peter wanted to be angry at the fact that she had now taken his ability to use his sword from him too. Even after months, she still seemed to be claiming victory over him. While he did not bear her brand anymore, but by Aslan, he would have sworn he felt it throb with his troubled thoughts.

Only then did a voice call his name, gently and quietly. Peter startled, clutching the area that once wore her mark. His heart pulsed against his chest in alarm.

_It is Edmund_, Peter reminded himself. He released his hold of his collarbone and found himself fiddling with his hands to try to ease some of the excess energy he had. He took a steadying breath, easing himself back to a state of remote calmness.

Edmund rounded the corner not long after he called his name. Wrapped in a robe, Edmund must have only woken up if his disheveled appearance was anything to go by.

If it was anyone else, Peter might have felt ashamed to be caught molding over his fears while looking at his sword, but Edmund was not like everybody else. He always understood even when he actually did not, always seemed to understand what Peter needed, even when Peter did not know it himself.

Instead of feeling that shame, after he had a glance at Edmund entering the armory, Peter returned his attention back to his sword.

"Sorry to make you look for me." Peter found himself saying when Edmund had not said a word for a while.

"It is never a bother," Edmund said. "I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

They both knew that their definition of okay had drastically changed since his capture with the White Witch. It was less of being actually fine and more of assessing how close he was to having a breakdown. Therefore, when Peter said that he was fine, he was not lying, but it was not what anyone else would have associated with the word _fine_.

Edmund never pressed him though, did not even ask him to talk about why they were in the armory in the waning hours of the night. Even if Peter never offered an explanation, Edmund would be fine with just staying with him until he was ready to leave.

Peter wanted to talk, wanted to tell Edmund everything he was feeling, even if it was not coherent. He swallowed hard. He desperately wanted to somehow release all of his feelings.

Oreius had warned him not to deal with everything all at once, and while he listened to that advice for the most part, he could not ignore the way his heart sank just even thinking of his soldiers being slaughtered as they had before. Every time he even held his sword in any attempts to practice with it, he was immediately brought back to that day. It made him feel as if he was still as broken as he was when he was first saved.

Lady Wan had said that his progress was promising, and Peter had thought he was doing better too. Granted, there were still nights he woke up with terrors, but most of them did not devastate him all day anymore. However, there were some facts he could not change no matter how much time grew in between and his feelings around them would not change either.

"How did you use your sword again," Peter asked, "after you destroyed her wand and all you could remember was—was what happened after?" He could not bear to actually say aloud that the Witch had stabbed Edmund that day.

His mind flashed to the memory: Edmund collapsing with a thud, Peter running over, and watching him bleed out—he sharply closed his eyes.

_ No, Lucy saved him_, he corrected himself. He remembered Lucy giving him the cordial. He remembered hugging Edmund after. _Edmund dying that day was just an illusion_, he silently reminded. He let out the breath he had not realized he was holding.

When Peter could open his eyes again, he saw concern flicker across Edmund's face.

"I am fine," Peter reassured. Softly, he explained, "Just a bad memory." Edmund nodded in accepting his answer. Concern remained in his expression, but he moved back to Peter's original question instead of pressing him.

"Beruna is not really the same thing as after what you went through, Pete," Edmund pointed out. His voice flat and placid, just pointing out their situations were different. He paused before thoughtfully saying, "I do not remember you having a problem after Beruna either, and you had fought against her there."

"That is because we had won," Peter admitted. "It did not matter that I almost lost to her because Aslan had—saved me."

Had Aslan heard his guards' scream when they died protecting Peter as he had? Did Aslan know what it felt like to have his people die around him when he could nothing to stop it?

"But Quazz, Kel, all of them, I watched them die, and I could do nothing to stop it. I could not even protect myself." Sharpness latched itself to his tone. He was angry, he realized. Angry at himself still.

"What more could you have done? You were outnumbered and ambushed," Edmund asked, almost bitterly, as if the mere memory of the ambush had made him taste something sour.

"I do not know," he whispered. "I just wished I could have done more. They all died to protect me, and they died for nothing." His voice wavered. He looked away from his sword then.

Peter heard Edmund take a deep breath. At first, Peter thought that Edmund was just going to silently study him until Peter spoke again or that Edmund had a big speech planned.

Yet, all he said, "I wish there was more you could have done too, but there is not. You did your best to protect yourself and them. You are angry at yourself for something you could not control." This time, Peter forced himself to look at his brother. There was worry in those brown eyes, uncertainty if Peter was going to break apart from such a small conversation.

"I just wish—" _to not have failed all of them_, his mind finished when the words fell short of his lips.

After brief silence, Edmund said, "You do not have to live with this regret about that day. You had done all you could."

"Not going on the trip would have been easier."

"You say that knowing what we know now. We could not have known it was a trap." Edmund moved to his side, looking up at Rhindon as he continued, "Besides, you, above all people, never would have stayed here when you thought our people needed help. That is just not the King you are."

"No, I am the King who is too afraid to even use his sword again," he admitted for the first time aloud. His eyes went to Edmund, trying to read him. Was he surprised? Disappointed?

He was neither. Instead, he had a gentle expression in his face, one of sympathy, maybe even understanding.

"You will," Edmund reassured with such conviction Peter almost could believe him. "One day, you are going to take that sword again because Narnia will need you to, and I know you will because you took that sword from Father Christmas in the first place and have used it ever since to defend us all over and over again. You will again."

"I do not think I am strong enough," Peter admitted, feeling the color flush to his cheeks.

Edmund shrugged, almost casually, before saying, "You have handled everything that has happened to you so far. I have no doubts you can overcome this too." Peter appreciated how much Edmund believed in him, even still. He still believed that Peter could recover, no matter what.

"The problem is that half of me wishes to go back before everything happened, yet the other half desperately wants to move on from it all," Peter almost pleaded. "It is like I am caught in-between."

Edmund was quiet for a while. When he spoke again, he looked to Peter. He said gently, almost knowingly, "It sounds to me like you will not be able to make peace until you let go of the part that wants to go back. I am not saying to remove all the desire to change the past. That is unrealistic, but the longing to change it, you need to let go."

Peter did not know if he could. That failure and that loss hurt him deeply. Because it was not just him who had faced the consequences of his failings.

"Because there is no magic, no trick, nothing that allows us to go back in time," Edmund continued. "And while you should not have gone through what you did, you have survived, and that was what she did not want you to do. She was not able to break you beyond repair."

"How do you know that she did not?" There were certainly days that Peter thought so, that he doubted if he could be the kind of person Narnia needed anymore.

"You are standing here, fighting with yourself on what to do," Edmund answered easily. Quietly, he added, "If she succeeded, I do not think you would be."

He did fight against the nightmares and his fears, almost every day. With everything he had, he had been trying to regain what the Witch had taken from him. But did that mean he could lead the same way he had?

"You sound too sure," Peter pointed out.

"You have been doing well. I know it does not feel like it sometimes. I do not doubt you can do this too." Edmund gestured to Rhindon, as if to encompass all that would be entailed in using Rhindon again.

"How can you not doubt me at all? Yes, I have been doing better, but you make it sound like I can lead an army again."

All Peter could focus was on the panic that gripped him whenever he even thought about using his sword again. It was like a weight that dragged his heart down in his chest. It made him uneasy. What could Edmund possibly see that Peter did not?

"I have faith," he answered.

_Oh, in Aslan_, Peter realized to himself.

He should have known that Edmund's faith would always be in Aslan to guide them.

"That Aslan will help me," Peter supplied.

"I have faith in you," Edmund corrected. Peter could not suppress the smile that reached his lips. Because through everything, Edmund still believed in him, and that meant more to Peter than anything else.

"I love you, Ed," was all Peter managed to say in that moment. His voice wavered. He felt warmth in his chest, surrounding his heart.

Edmund smiled proudly, saying, "I love you too, Pete."

Peter put his arm around his shoulder before he said, "I really do not know what I would do without you." Not long after did the two of them returned upstairs to try to sleep once more.

While Peter may not have solved his sword problem right then, he was filled with a new vigor to keep trying, even when a task seemed impossible. Because knowing that his brother had faith in him meant more to him then he could possibly express.

Edmund had said he would one day be able to return and protect Narnia when it mattered, and for the first time in a long time, Peter was able to believe that.

* * *

**Author's Note: Thank you for taking the time to read this! I appreciate the support for Breaking Magnificence and my other two stories! I will be posting another Narnia fic soon, and I hope to post many more to come. Thanks again!**


End file.
